NOVEL WEB 40: Talking it Out
Over the next two days, I began to get acquainted with my new body… and the reactions of others when they saw it. The most notable one was when I tracked down Finn.
He was standing guard at the side gate by himself, shivering his butt off in the cold.
I approached with a large dose of apprehension, but it all evaporated when he heard the crunch of snow underfoot, turned, saw me, recognised me, and then laughed. “Kai? For real?”
“Kaia, now,” I corrected him gently. “Turns out those gender issues weren't going to give me a choice.”
“No shit!” He grinned. “That sucks! I was really hoping… you know? Whatever, though. You look good!”
“I… do?”
He laughed, and cocked his hip and gave me a jokingly critical look up and down. “Mmmm, guuurl… I'm not gonna lie, your threads could use some work. Once this lil’ storm has blown over, I'm taking you shopppinggg.”
He couldn't keep a straight face as he finished his ‘yass queen’ bit, and burst out into a fit of giggles. “Okay, nah. I'm not that kind of gay.”
“I'm so glad you're chill about this," I said, tone oozing relief.
“Ah, it's whatever,” he shrugged. “We were interested, but it's not like we dated or caught feelings or whatever. A quick little makeout sesh for fun isn't enough to cause any heartbreak.”
“I guess that's true…” I still thought he was cute and hot, though. Damn gender stuff! Although… gosh! If I found someone like Finn who was into girls…
I kept him company for about ten minutes longer, and day dreamed about finding a guy to… have fun with. I was so grateful he was calm about my sudden change of gender, though.
The next day, two days after waking up, Chloe arrived on the doorstep of the workshop looking all kinds of shy and confused by the chaos she found inside.
Putting the hoe handle I was carving down, I pushed my safety goggles up my head and hurried over. “Hey! Chloe!”
She saw me and glared daggers at me for half a second, but then she seemed to remember we weren’t mortal enemies anymore and mellowed, flashing a hesitant, stilted smile. Her dyed black hair was starting to show a little brown at the roots, but once again I took a second to admire the way it fell naturally into ringlets towards the end of each strand. So fucking pretty.
“What did you need?” I asked with a guarded smile. I know I was trying to befriend her… but the angry glare had reminded me that it wasn't long ago I resolved to dislike her.
“Did you make my grinder?” She asked.
“Oh!” I gasped, and turned, ushering her in behind me. “Yeah, come on, I'll show you.”
We hurried over to the rack where finished projects sat, and I pulled the heavy metal off the shelf with deceptive ease and carried it over to my work table. The hammer was actually still sitting on the table where I'd finished hafting it earlier this morning.
“So,” I said triumphantly. “It took a bit to design, but basically, this thick flat section beside the main grinding chamber is for you to break the bones into smaller pieces with that hammer. Once it's all nice and bite-sized, you pop it in here.”
I lifted the lid on the grinding chamber and showed her the gnarly looking hemisphere of dark tempered squiron bristling with carefully filed teeth. I pulled a second hemisphere out of the hollow base and showed her how the teeth were finer on this one.
“These teeth were an absolute pain in the ass,” I said, lifting it to eye level. “We had to make sure the metal was forged and tempered tough enough to withstand grinding shit up. Anyway, it's yours now.”
“You actually made it,” she said, reaching out to touch the cold metal. “Thank you.”
Then she tried to lift it, and it barely budged. “What the fuck?”
Sheepishly, I grabbed the hammer and put it in my toolbelt, then lifted the grinder. “Uh… I have points in strength. Where do you need it?”
“That looks so strange with you being so damn short,” she muttered. Looking back towards the entrance, she said, “I guess we could put it beside my planters? I have something else to talk to you about anyway, so this trip works out.”
“Oh?” I asked, quirking an eyebrow at her. I wonder what it was she wanted to talk about?
“Let's leave first,” she said curtly, and strode towards the exit.
Goddess, though, but her reaction to how I lifted the grinder was amazing. The way her eyes bugged out as I effortlessly picked up the heavy chunk of metal. Then after that when she glanced at my arms like she couldn't believe it… perfect.
I don't know why exactly, but being so small but also so strong was… fun? I loved the reaction she had. I might be smol, but I was powerful!
Following dutifully behind her with the gear, I couldn't help but speculate. Was she going to tell me some dark secret, or maybe a discovery she'd made with her herbs. Oh, crap! What if she'd discovered my dual identity?
April was loading her crucible with squiron when we came out, and on seeing me, laughed, dropped what she was doing, and came over. Before I could speak, she placed her hand on the top of my head and said, “Cute and strong, capable of great lifting, but also soft.”
I growled in embarrassed annoyance, and she danced backwards, giggling like a loon.
Chloe stared at us with a bemused little smile, and instantly I lost some of my grump in the face of it. Anything that could get her to smile might be fine.
“Let's go before she ropes us into pedalling the bellows,” I said, and shouldered the external forge gate open.
“Have fun, Kaia! You'll be pedalling when you come back, regardless!” April teased as we left.
“She's an interesting person,” Chloe observed neutrally.
“The epitome of a golden retriever lesbian,” I agreed. “She's crazy smart, though.”
Chloe perked up. “She's gay?”
“Yup!” I nodded. “I'm bi, too. Was before the transition, and I am now.”
“I'm bi too,” she murmured, looking at me with an inscrutable expression. “How many other queer people do you know?”
“Uh…” I paused, almost saying Estelle, but she never told us that. I only knew she'd been queer because Chloe told me as Silver. “One other, but I'm not going to out them.”
“Fair enough.”
We continued walking along the cleared path through the snow in silence, until I asked, “So what did you want to talk about?”
“Right… uh, so the Captain was contacted by Cynath, who said that Silver… Silver is still recovering and can't come to finish her promise for the respec thing.” Chloe said, voice hitching as she mentioned Silver. “The Captain said he couldn't be seen favouring one god over another, so he asked me to organise setting up a shrine.”
“Oh…” I said, a little confused… until I realised, “He's offloading it onto the obviously goth witchy girl.”
Chloe frowned. “It's not like that. Think about it for one fucking second. So long as the crazy preacher still thinks he can sway the cap, he won't try anything more drastic.”
“I see your point,” I conceded, but gave her a reproachful look. “There's no need to use that tone and swear at me, though?”
“What tone?” Her frown deepened. “And I was just swearing for emphasis.”
Sighing, I remembered my earlier theories about her. “Okay. It just came off as very hostile. Sorry.”
“It wasn't meant to be,” she grumbled as we reached the door to the foyer.
“Alright,” I said, making a conscious effort to shove my defensive reaction down. She wasn’t trying to hurt me, she was just really shit at social interaction sometimes.
She held the swinging door for me as I carried the grinder, but as she let go, it swung back and hit her in the butt. Turning super fast, she hissed at the door. Then, slowly, she turned to stare at me as her cheeks began to flame red.
“Hot. Angry. Goth,” I said, enunciating each word.
“I'm not a hag!” She seethed, stomping her foot.
Choosing a spot out of the way but close to her planters, I set the grinder down and then turned to stare at her, one hand on my hip. “Chloe. How is it that hag is your takeaway from that, and not, ‘oh gosh, Kaia thinks I'm hot!’”
“I— huh?” She blinked.
Stepping closer to her, I gave her my most goofy, conciliatory smile. “It's a compliment. You're hot, you're angry in a fierce way, and you pull off the goth aesthetic really well, even during the literal apocalypse. Plus, you basically have a witch class, so the acronym is like, lore appropriate now.”
“I am… but everyone, all those dickheads, they used it as an insult,” she said. “I don't like it.”
“They were idiots,” I shrugged. “But noted. It wasn't very tactful of me. I won't call you that again.”
“Thank you,” she grumbled, looking everywhere but at me. “I… thanks for the grinder, too.”
“You're welcome,” I said, watching as thoughts raced around behind her eyes.
She scratched absently at her forearm, then gave a little gasp, “Oh! Right! So yeah, Silver and her goddess Cynath protected the school, and she was also meant to give us some way to respec our classes. Unfortunately… something happened and Silver is missing, so Cynath decided… wait I already mentioned that. Okay so yeah, I'm in charge of making the shrine. Only problem is that I'm not a crafter like that. I make hex bags, not shrines…”
I honestly hadn’t expected the captain to offload the job onto Chloe. I guess it made sense, though? Regardless…
“So you want my help?” I asked.
She nodded. “Yeah. That'd be fucking great.” Her expression darkened a half second later. “That was meant to be like, grateful by the way. I'm not swearing at you, angry-like.”
Trying to contain a giggle, I gave her a pat on the arm. “I know, I got that.”
“I was thinking we could put it out in that patch of grass between the bike shed and the tennis courts?” She mused, completely oblivious to my amusement. “We could have a little carved wooden statue in a tiny house like a little wayside shrine.”
Giving it some thought, I imagined what we might need to make it. What if we cast the statue out of squiron? Immie was a pretty good sculptor, so if she made a clay prototype… yeah that'd work. The little house itself was relatively easy, we had the wood for it…
“I think that'll work. Here's what I'd do…”
